4 weeks old

My sweet baby is 4 weeks old today. I can't believe that much time has passed already. I try not to think about how he has been in a hospital since day 1, and will continue to be in a hospital for many more days. Instead, we decided to celebrate NICU style.

First: we had some professional pictures taken. In the NICU. With all his cords and dungeon like crib. We weren't hiding anything. This is his life (for now) and we wanted to document it in its entirety. The photographer was nice enough to send me 1 picture while she gets all the rest done. This was seriously only the 2nd picture she took. He gave a nice baby smile. And best of all, we caught one of his darling dimples. He has another dimple on the other side but we've yet to catch that.

I'm so glad there are photographers out there willing to come in to the hospital and capture pictures for me.

Secondly: DRUM ROLL PLEASE:

Jackson is no longer a patient in the Newborn Intensive Care Unit! He was transferred to the Infant Unit. This is such a huge step in getting Jax home. The surgeon kept telling us that he wanted him out of the NICU because "Jackson is not sick. The NICU is for critically sick babies." So when we got the word that he was being transferred I was so happy. His care is being taken over by the GI (gastrointestinal) doctors who specialize in his exact problem. We loved the Dr.s in the NICU but they aren't specialists in babies who are missing large portions of intestine. And fittingly, Jackson's new Dr. is named Dan Jackson. The GI doctors are very gung ho and optimistic about his care and their plan for him. They want to keep increasing his feeds by mouth to where hopefully, hopefully, he can try nursing until he's full. Maybe even next week. The hardest thing about all of this is seeing my poor baby hungry and not being able to do anything about it. He loves to eat(he is an etherington) and when you only get 1 tsp every 3 hours, you want more. Lately he's been getting a little fussy at night because he is plain ole hungry. It breaks my heart as I try my hardest to console him. Luckily, he does calm pretty quickly and a binkie and some snuggling will distract him. Our biggest goal in this transfer is .........getting Jackson home. The end is finally in sight. Not as in this week, or next week, or the next.....but we are hoping to have our family together by this time next month. We are keeping our fingers crossed.
Here is Jackson's new room. Lovely, sterile, and white. But PRIVATE!! That lovely chair in the back is where we can sleep or nap if needed. We even have our own TV, DVD player and private bathroom. It is so different than being in the NICU. At the NICU there were 6 babies in one room with a nurse constantly at their bedside(which wasn't a bad thing necessarily). Now we have our own room where we can shut the door, be all together, be a little louder and have more privacy. The nurses don't come in unless there is a reason to while parents are there. That being said, when we are gone, they visit his room frequently, rock him when he needs it and take wonderful care of him. It's a little strange getting use to the big differences between units and we miss a couple of Jackson's wonderful nurses who became our friends. But we're so thankful for his progress and hope to keep sailing along the road to coming home!